Monday, November 1, 2004

NEW TWIST ON SEARCH FROM BAIDU.COM

From Esther Dyson, tech guru...

search'n'chatIt seems like such an easy trick as not to be worth a whole blog entry (it's the transaction cost, y'know), but the best thing I have heard about in search lately is something offered by Baidu.com - the leading search engine in China. (I don't read Chinese and can't confirm this independently...but the concept is brilliant if simple).

For any search term, you can click a link to (dynamically created the first time) message thread dedicated to that term. For example, search on "K-3 remedial reading" and you'll get comments from experts offering advice, people soliciting ideas, perhaps disgruntled users of a particular product.... the founder, Robin Li, says spam is not a problem. perhaps there's some self-policing mechanism, and as the thing scales you could add slashdot-like functions... (full post)